Liz Kessler studied English at Loughborough University, then took a teaching qualification at Keele University, and more recently a Masters in Creative Writing at Manchester Metropolitan University. She worked as a teacher, teaching English and Media Studies, and has also run Creative Writing courses. As a journalist she worked on local and regional newspapers in…
Jane Johnson is a writer – for adults and for children – and a publisher. She is Fiction Publishing Director for HarperCollins Publishers UK, where she is responsible for the Voyager science fiction and fantasy list, as well as publishing thrillers and some historical fiction. Her new book, Goldseekers, is set in 17th century Cornwall and…
Marie-Louise Jensen is an author of historical fiction for young people. Where does your inspiration come from? History! I get all my ideas for stories from historical events or eras that have captured my imagination. What comes first – plot, character or situation? Usually a situation. For example in my second novel, the Lady in the…
Award-winning author Julia Jarman has written over 60 books for children. When she was 8 years old she decided to become a children’s writer and actually had some work published. After studying English and Drama at university Julia went on to become a teacher. It was while reading to her three children that she realised…
British children’s and young adult author Mary Hooper was born in Barnes, South West London. She left school at fifteen, and went to work as a window dresser, and then as a secretary. She eventually returned to school, as an adult student, earning a degree in English from Reading University. Hooper began her writing career…
John Hegley was born in north London and was educated in Luton, Bristol and Bradford University. His first public performance monies came from busking his songs, initially outside a shoe shop in Hull, in the late Seventies. He performed on the streets of London in the early Eighties, fronting the Popticians, with whom he also…
Sally Grindley began writing in 1984 while she was working for a children’s book club. Since 1995 she has been writing full time and has recently won the Smarties Prize. She now has some fifty titles in print. Shhh won the Children’s Book Award in 1992 and was shortlisted for the Smarties Prize. Wake Up Dad won the 1989 Best…
Julia Green is the author of more than fifteen books for young people. Her novels for younger children (7- 11) include Tilly’s Moonlight Fox, Sylvie and Star and Seal Island (published by Oxford University Press). When you start to write a book, do you know how it will end? I do lots of ‘pre-writing’ notes, and think and doodle before…
Katie M Grant is a children’s writer, based in Scotland, who is perhaps best known for her DeGranville Trilogy, published by Walker Books. She was inspired by her own family history to write How the Hangman Lost His Heart. Her ancestor, Colonel Francis Towneley, or Uncle Frank, was the last man in Britain to be hanged,…